The mistake almost everyone makes: answering this question with the sale price. The surcharge tests DOF's market value — the "Market Value" line on your Notice of Property Value. For a SoHo loft that figure is usually a long way below what the apartment would fetch, and the gap runs in the owner's favor. The median DOF market value across all 2,313 condo and co-op units in 10012 is $808,817.
Where DOF's number comes from
New York does not let the city assess a condo or co-op on what it sells for. Class 2 property is valued as though the building were a rental: DOF takes income and expense data from comparable rental buildings, capitalizes it, and calls the result market value. Your closing price is not an input. Neither is your neighbor's.
For prewar Manhattan rentals this produces numbers that look nothing like the sales market, and SoHo is an extreme case. 1,376 of the 2,313 units on the roll here — 59% — carry a DOF market value under $1,000,000 and owe nothing under Phase 1 no matter who lives there or doesn't. Two further units owe nothing for an unrelated reason covered at the end of this page, which brings the total owing nothing to 1,378. Many of them would trade for two or three times that.
Which is why "my loft is worth $3 million so I owe $158,000" is usually wrong, and occasionally wrong in the other direction.
583 Broadway, twenty-two ways
One cast-iron building on the corner of Prince. Every unit shares a facade, a lobby, and an elevator. Here is the whole building as DOF has it on the July roll:
| Unit | DOF market value | Surcharge if non-primary |
|---|---|---|
| Apt 3M | $996,156 | $0 — under threshold |
| Apt 3B | $1,101,729 | $44,069 / yr |
| Apt PH | $1,142,469 | $45,699 / yr |
| Apt 2M | $1,589,620 | $63,585 / yr |
| Apt 4M | $1,589,620 | $63,585 / yr |
| Apt 6M | $1,593,654 | $63,746 / yr |
| Apt 5M | $1,593,654 | $63,746 / yr |
| Apt 12B | $1,630,315 | $65,213 / yr |
| Apt 10M | $1,634,285 | $65,371 / yr |
| Apt 7M | $1,634,285 | $65,371 / yr |
| Apt 11B | $1,654,770 | $66,191 / yr |
| Apt 9B | $1,691,321 | $67,653 / yr |
| Apt 12M | $1,776,676 | $71,067 / yr |
| Apt 11M | $1,776,676 | $71,067 / yr |
| Apt 4B | $1,805,221 | $72,209 / yr |
| Apt 6B | $1,813,211 | $72,528 / yr |
| Apt 5B | $1,813,211 | $72,528 / yr |
| Apt 10B | $1,845,855 | $73,834 / yr |
| Apt 7B | $1,849,875 | $73,995 / yr |
| Apt 8B | $1,849,875 | $73,995 / yr |
| Apt 2B | $1,867,208 | $74,688 / yr |
| Apt 8M/9M | $3,431,314 | $180,144 / yr |
Apt 3M misses the threshold by $3,844 and owes nothing. Apt 8M/9M owes $180,144 a year. In between, twenty units bunched between $1,101,729 and $1,867,208 pay somewhere in the forty-to-seventy-five-thousand range. Nobody in the building could have guessed their own number from the sales comps.
Two cliffs, and the tax is flat at both
Phase-1 rates for condos and co-ops apply to the entire market value, not to the amount above the threshold. 4% from $1M to $3M. 5.25% from $3M to $5M. 6.5% above $5M. That reading of the rate table is the conservative one, and it is the one our counsel confirmed and every figure on this site uses; if DOF ends up administering it marginally, real bills land lower than what we show, never higher.
The flat structure puts a knife edge at each band boundary. Two real examples from 10012:
| DOF market value | Rate | Annual surcharge | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 103 Greene Street | $998,757 | — | $0 |
| 304 Bowery | $1,003,236 | 4% | $40,129 |
| 41 Bond Street | $2,959,397 | 4% | $118,376 |
| 135 West 3 Street | $3,013,947 | 5.25% | $158,232 |
The first pair is separated by $4,479 of assessed market value and $40,129 of annual tax. The second pair is separated by $54,550 of value and $39,856 of tax. If your loft sits within a few percent of $1M, $3M or $5M on the roll, the value itself is worth checking before anything else — a correction of $54,550 is the difference between two very different years.
74 buildings in SoHo have units on both sides
Of the 174 buildings in 10012 with any exposure, 74 contain units above the line and units below it. 285 Lafayette Street is the clearest case: 30 units on the roll, 9 of them under $1,000,000 and owing nothing — the lowest is $274,714 — while Apt 7DE at $2,713,338 owes $108,534. Same address, same board, same building-wide DOF valuation. Different share of it.
So "does my building get hit" is not a question with an answer. Only "does my unit."
The class-1 problem, where $0 and six figures are both defensible
A handful of SoHo and NoHo buildings are condominiums sitting on tax lots classified as class 1 — small buildings, three or four units, the kind of NoHo conversion that reads as a townhouse to the assessor and as a condo to the deed. The statute sets one rate schedule for 1–3 family homes ($0 below $5M, then 0.8%/1.05%/1.3%) and a different one for condos and co-ops ($0 below $1M, then 4%/5.25%/6.5%). These units answer to both descriptions.
Five units in 10012 land in that gap. The spread is not academic:
| Unit | DOF market value | Under the house schedule | Under the condo schedule |
|---|---|---|---|
| 178 Sullivan Street, Apt 1A | $2,570,482 | $0 | $102,819 |
| 178 Sullivan Street, Apt 2A | $2,675,518 | $0 | $107,021 |
| 41 Great Jones Street, Apt 3 | $10,001,649 | $80,013 | $650,107 |
| 41 Great Jones Street, Apt 1 | $8,742,783 | $69,942 | $568,281 |
| 41 Great Jones Street, Apt 2 | $8,605,568 | $68,845 | $559,362 |
178 Sullivan Street Apt 1A is either exempt or facing $102,819 a year, and the roll alone does not settle it. Citywide there are 25,766 units in the same position. Our reports flag them and show both figures; the notice DOF sends is what resolves it, and if the answer that arrives is the expensive one, that is a determination worth reviewing rather than paying.
What to actually do
- Pull the real number first. Not the sale price, not the appraisal, not the $1,000,000 rule of thumb — the market value on the roll for your specific unit. It is public, and for co-ops DOF published imputed per-unit values for 36,677 units this year, so most SoHo shareholders no longer need to hunt for their share percentage.
- If it is close to a band edge, know which door moves a value. DOF's ordinary Request for Review is not available for fiscal 2026-27 — 19 RCNY §62-05(a) opens it only for years beginning July 1, 2027 or later. For this year the route that moves a market value is the Tax Commission on Form TC107, due March 1, 2027 for class 2 and March 15, 2027 for class 1. DOF publishes the final version of the roll addendum on December 31, 2026 — that is its own publication milestone, not a filing window for you.
- Keep the two remedies straight. Arguing that the value is wrong and arguing that the unit is your primary residence are different filings, on different clocks, at different windows. Which door you're at →
Questions owners ask
Is the NYC pied-à-terre tax based on my apartment's sale price?
No. It is based on the Department of Finance's market value for the unit — the figure on the Notice of Property Value. New York values class 2 condos and co-ops as if the building were a rental, using income from comparable rental buildings, so DOF market values for SoHo lofts are typically well below what the same apartment would sell for. Assessed value, which is 45% of market value for class 2, is also not the base.
Can two apartments in the same SoHo building owe completely different amounts?
Yes, and it is common. At 583 Broadway, Apt 3M carries a DOF market value of $996,156 and owes nothing, while Apt 8M/9M at $3,431,314 owes $180,144 a year. 74 of the 174 exposed buildings in ZIP 10012 have units on both sides of the $1,000,000 threshold.
Is the surcharge charged on the full value or only the amount above the threshold?
On the full value, under the flat reading of the rate table that this site uses throughout and that our counsel confirmed as the sound conservative interpretation. A unit at $3,013,947 owes 5.25% of the whole $3,013,947 — $158,232 — not 5.25% of the amount over $3M. That is why crossing a band boundary by a few thousand dollars of assessed value can add tens of thousands to the bill. If DOF administers the schedule marginally, actual bills would be lower.
My SoHo condo is in a three-unit building. Which rate schedule applies?
That may be genuinely unsettled. Condominium units on class-1 tax lots answer to both the 1–3 family schedule ($0 below $5M, then 0.8%–1.3%) and the condo schedule ($0 below $1M, then 4%–6.5%). Five units in ZIP 10012 and 25,766 citywide sit in that gap. One $2,570,482 unit on Sullivan Street is either exempt or facing $102,819 a year depending on which reading DOF applies. Your official notice resolves it.
Get the number DOF actually has on you.
Free emailed report: your unit's market value from the July roll, the flat-rate surcharge test, both schedules if your unit is one of the ambiguous ones, and what the exits look like. Usually within the hour.
Check My Unit — FreeDisclaimer. This page is educational information from Conquest, a licensed New York real estate brokerage. It is not legal, tax, zoning, or accounting advice, and no advisory relationship is created by reading it. Zoning, certificate-of-occupancy and Loft Board questions are matters for a land-use attorney; surcharge liability is a matter for your tax counsel. Deadlines and figures reflect DOF's published rules and roll as of the "last updated" date above. DOF extended the exemption-application deadline to September 18, 2026, superseding the August dates printed on its July letters — confirm any date here against DOF's own page before you rely on it.